Nigerian banks lose N199 Billion to online scams

Nigerian banks have lost a total of N199 billion to e-fraud between 2,000 and 2014, mostly due to inappropriate and reckless management of customers’ data, according to various reports.

A security assessment of Nigerian banks’ websites in the last two weeks carried out by Easy Solutions Ltd., a global e-fraud protection firm, indicated that electronic fraudsters had invaded Nigerian banking environment, deploying over 185 fake mobile applications on the websites of 15 out of 17 deposit money banks with which they are extracting customers’ personal and financial information with intent to steal billions of naira from bank accounts.

According to Leadership Newspaper, the latest study showed that Nigerian banks in the past four weeks faced defacement attacks on their websites. Other attacks include email spamming targeting both banks’ websites and customers’ emails with intent to slow the websites and steal customer financial data.

Sources say Easy Solutions, which presented these findings at a one-day e-payment anti-fraud forum organised by Winigroup Ltd. in Lagos last Wednesday for chief information officers (CIOs) of banks and CBN officials, also showed that the banks are under constant cyber defacement attacks.

Mr. Dipo Fatokun, director, Banking and Payments System, CBN, said that the development was a threat to the stability of the banking industry and said that to battle the upsurge of e-fraud, CBN would work with relevant stakeholders to establish an industry security operations centre and a risk information centre in order to reduce e-payments frauds and enhance trust in the payments system.

In February this year, Deloitte said phishing and insider threats will continue to be biggest cyber threat sources in Nigeria, especially as crude oil prices continue to fall, reports reveal.

Sources also say in May, the Nigerian Interbank Settlement System (NIBSS) ePayment Fraud Landscape Report stated that there was 85 per cent success in fraud attempts. It also noted that automated teller machines (ATMs) had most fraudulent transactions while Internet banking fraud loss was put at N3.2 billion within the last one year.

Mr. Jeremy Boorer, International director, Easy Solutions, said: “We looked at 17 Nigerian banks 10 days ago for signs of fake mobile apps. In 15 of them, we found the following: The first to 10th banks checked were found with 13, 10, 17, eight, 11, eight, nine, 13, seven and 20 fake mo-bile apps respectively. The 11th to 15th banks were also found with 11, 14, 13, 16 and 15 fake mobile apps.’

According to Nigeriacommunicationsweek, he warned bank customers that app stores were full of fake apps claiming to come from banks, saying once a customer downloads and enters financial information, including credit/debit cards details and personal identity numbers (PIN), his/her money is gone as the fraudster will clone the cards or transfer the money through online banking immediately.